Valtteri Bottas admitted there’s a lot of work to be done at Mercedes after an “eye opening” Bahrain Grand Prix.
The Finn finished second – a positive after a disappointing season opener in Melbourne – but said it’s too early to know where he stands in the championship fight
“It’s difficult to say about the balance in terms of the championship, title fight, because it’d only race two of 21,” he said.
“I got some points today but Sebastian, who’s leading the championship, got more points.
“It’s early days, but anyway a lot better than two weeks ago. And even today, the race pace we had was actually slightly better than we expected coming into today so that was positive.
“I think this weekend has really opened up our eyes in terms of how much we still have work to do with the car in certain conditions. It’s really fast but like yesterday we could spot some weaknesses of the car and even today. It’s been an important weekend. We need to make sure we keep improving those negatives we have to Ferrari.”
Bottas qualified third but a strong start allowed him to pass Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen on the opening lap. But a battle with overheating tyres meant he couldn’t bring the fight to Vettel as much as he would have liked.
“It is disappointing when you get so close but I have to say the last three laps my tyres started to go off.
“We struggled all the race with tyre overheating so we had to manage the tyres a lot.
“You could push a few laps but then had to back off.
“Pace wise, it has been good this weekend, but I wanted to win so we cannot be fully satisfied.”
Bottas leaves Bahrain third in the drivers’ championship, 11 points behind team-mate Lewis Hamilton and 28 behind championship leader Vettel.
